Disclosed herein is an apparatus and method that evaluates printing apparatus cleaner performance.
Presently, image output devices, such as printers, multifunction media devices, xerographic machines, and other devices produce images on media sheets, such as paper, substrates, transparencies, plastic, cardboard, or other media sheets. To produce an image, a developer applies marking material, such as toner, ink jet ink, or other marking material, to a photoreceptor or other marking material image receiver. The marking material is then transferred from the photoreceptor to a media sheet to create an image on the media sheet.
A photoreceptor cleaner cleans toner, film, and other debris and material from the photoreceptor. Unfortunately, photoreceptor cleaners require adjustment or replacement as they age. Thus, the photoreceptor cleaners require maintenance at regular intervals to maintain consistent image quality on the media sheets. For example, some photoreceptor cleaners, such as cleaner blades, have a well known random failure mode. The time of failure and the location of failure along the length of the blade both have a distribution with long tails, which makes it very difficult to predict when and where a failure will occur. Most blades are capable of very long lives, but they are typically replaced well before failure in order to prevent an unscheduled failure if an individual blade happens to be one of the blades out on the early failure tail of the life distribution. Attempts have been made to predict blade life through algorithms based on monitoring blade stress conditions, such as low area coverage, environment, and/or job length. These methods have been somewhat successful in predicting average blade life but predictions for individual blades are still not particularly useful.
Thus, there is a need for an apparatus and method that evaluates printing apparatus cleaner performance.